Tuning my amp (Its confusing)

[Hoots]

Thanks for the help man , quick question how do I found out how many volts my car has? I'm confused on that , where amps say they go down to 8 volts and up to 16 , what does that mean and how do I know my volts , its a 1996 nissan sentra gxe

 

[C1500martin 10+ year member]

Thats ehat your car runs at. Standard car batts should have a resting voltage of 12.6 or around there. With your car on that gets higher (hopefully). Cars vary, just put a dmm to your amps +/- and see what it reads. Companies rate amps differently but common is at 14.4V my truck had a max charging of 13.5 with my stock alt and battery. So no matter what i did my amps would never put out what theyre supposed to because my truck didnt allow it. A new Alt with a higher voltage cjamged that.

 

[Hoots]

Thats ehat your car runs at. Standard car batts should have a resting voltage of 12.6 or around there. With your car on that gets higher (hopefully). Cars vary, just put a dmm to your amps +/- and see what it reads. Companies rate amps differently but common is at 14.4V my truck had a max charging of 13.5 with my stock alt and battery. So no matter what i did my amps would never put out what theyre supposed to because my truck didnt allow it. A new Alt with a higher voltage cjamged that.

i did that and nothing was showing up on my dmm , i dont get why its not working i have it on ac voltage also...

 

[C1500martin 10+ year member]

What dmm do you have? Its user error or its broken. But it has to work.

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

i did that and nothing was showing up on my dmm , i dont get why its not working i have it on ac voltage also...

DC voltage turn it to 20.

 

[Hoots]

Is your box as well built and designed as his? Is your amp as quality is his?(500 watts from a good amp is totally worlds apart from 500 watts from a cheapo amp) is your voltages as stable at 14.4V as his? Is your impedance rise at a good point or is it waay too **** high? Does your vehicle have a blow through hole to let the bass in the cabin like his? Its very different for each setup man and it takes work to get it loud. Its not just toss everything in and hope to god it flexes, sorry it almost never works that way buddy unless you have a crazy build and know what you are doing.
The sedona line from PPI is just like power acoustik pretty overrated.

To get your sh*t setup right FOLLOW these.

That being said, set your head unit level to 75-85% volume, use a -6 db 50hz test tone, subwoofer level all the way up. High pass and low pass filters on the head unit set to 80hz. Head unit EQ set to flat, bass boost set to none, loudness off. Subsonic filter set to 75% of your ported box's tuning frequency. Low pass filter on the amp at 80hz.

Doing it by multi-meter: just follow the guides

Doing it by ear: have the tone playing, subs hooked up, start turning the level knob from left to right slowly. When you hear it distort or the tonality of the bass starts to change, then you are done. If it stops getting louder then you are done. In both those situations back it off a slight bit.

Btw it looks like guy in the video looks like has an alpine mrp500, That amp puts out good power even with box rise and its a lot more efficient and clean compared to a ppi sedona.

Ok so I played a 50 hz test tone , I had my subsonic at about 24 , my lp at 80 hz , I had my level at 5 volts and my hu at 35 the most it goes to is 50. I then started moving my level till it sounded to loud and weird, i then lowered it to about 4 volts. I played a bunch of songs , from the driver seat the bass is pretty powerful , it tilts my vibrates my seats and rear view mirror a lot. When I listen to music next to my sub i hear a thumping sound when the note hits low , I think its my box though it sounds like a wooden thump , could it be clippping? I mean i doubt it though. Plus 4 volts is pretty safe and conservative , only when I lower it to like 4.5 volts or close to 5 I dont hear that thump , but then again the power is very low and the sub isnt exerting to much.

 

---------- Post added at 06:58 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:57 PM ----------

 

Hoots....just try this.
On that PPI amp, set your LPF to about 50%....that 40-220hz range is crap. PPI used to be an outstanding brand, but now days...its just another Power Acoustik amp w/ another case (PPI, SoundStream, and power acoustik are owned by the same parent company now)

Use your HU's sub LPF....set that to 80-100hz.

As far as setting gain w/ a multimeter, well, EVERYTHING changes when you put an active load (a sub) and music in the mix.

Here is an OLD vid i did about setting gains w/ a multimeter...

Ok so I played a 50 hz test tone , I had my subsonic at about 24 , my lp at 80 hz , I had my level at 5 volts and my hu at 35 the most it goes to is 50. I then started moving my level till it sounded to loud and weird, i then lowered it to about 4 volts. I played a bunch of songs , from the driver seat the bass is pretty powerful , it tilts my vibrates my seats and rear view mirror a lot. When I listen to music next to my sub i hear a thumping sound when the note hits low , I think its my box though it sounds like a wooden thump , could it be clippping? I mean i doubt it though. Plus 4 volts is pretty safe and conservative , only when I lower it to like 4.5 volts or close to 5 I dont hear that thump , but then again the power is very low and the sub isnt exerting to much.